


Not exactly Casper

by beebot



Series: Violent deaths create the worst ghosts [1]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Ghost Ben Hargreeves, Haunting, Klaus Hargreeves Needs A Hug, Klaus Hargreeves Needs Help, Klaus Hargreeves-centric, No Incest, Pre-Canon, general spookiness, you all nasty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26543320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beebot/pseuds/beebot
Summary: In which death warps people, Ben is no longer the exception to the rule, and teenaged Klaus has to deal with a decidedly unfriendly ghost.
Relationships: Ben Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves, Klaus Hargreeves & Everyone, No Romantic Relationship(s)
Series: Violent deaths create the worst ghosts [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982728
Comments: 14
Kudos: 130





	Not exactly Casper

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: I haven’t seen season 2 yet. This is all based on season 1.
> 
> I saw Hotel Oblivion’s design for ghost Ben and he was SO unsettling I had to write this!

There are things in the academy that everyone chooses to ignore. 

Everyone except Klaus. That’s his curse, after all. But he sure tries his damnedest. 

The light bulbs in the sconce outside Klaus’s room burn out frequently. At first, once a month. After Ben’s death, weekly. Then, so frequently that Mom is ordered not to bother fixing them. 

Occasionally, cold spots appear around the academy, and they are never in the same spot twice. If anyone notices that they almost always appear when Klaus is near? Well, that’s just another thing they try to overlook. 

Nobody trusts the drunk and unreliable fifteen-year-old enough to turn to him. Their resident medium has been spiralling since long before his brother’s death.

* * *

_Allison cornered him in the front hall shortly after the funeral. Ben’s funeral, sweet and kind Ben, their gentle bookworm brother, dead already of a stupid training accident._

_They were both still in their formal mourning clothes, and Klaus couldn’t stop itching at the cuffs of his dress shirt. Stupid uncomfortable funeral clothes. He had a pounding headache and felt oddly confined. The walls were pressing in too much, and his sister was standing too close._

_"Have you called him up yet?" Allison asked without preamble. She watched him intently._

_Klaus shrugged vaguely and glanced aside. "Love to, really, but you know how it is..."_

_"You want him back, don't you?"_

_Klaus stared at her for a moment, taken aback. "Of course I do!"_

_"Well then, why don't you just stop drinking all the time and actually_ try _?" She asked offhandedly. Like it could be that simple. Like the consequences wouldn’t be disastrous for him, and likely unpleasant for Ben too._

_"Ghosts, they're not the same. It's..." he gestured loosely to nothing in particular, waving one hand. "It's not that easy."_

_Allison frowned a little. "Why not?"_

_A little rush of relief washed over him, taking him by surprise. Because, skeptical as she might be, she was_ still listening _. She trusted him. Maybe not very much — he knew he’d kind of earned that — but she trusted that he wouldn’t lie about the truly important stuff._

_"Oh, 's just, a violent death really messes a person up. But not like trauma. Like, bloodlust and revenge. And I mean, I want Ben back! But real Ben, not Ben like that."_

_Allison shook her head. "You could see our brother again, and you're being picky? Since when are you a perfectionist?" She pursed her lips in the way she always does when she’s unconvinced. “Ben loves us. He wouldn’t try to hurt us. He hates hurting people, you know that.”_

_“I know! I know! But I can’t bring him back, not really. If he’s not here, that’s because he’s somewhere better!”_

_She shot him a witheringly disappointed look. "I'd give_ anything _to see him again, even if he was acting a little off."_

_The implied ‘unlike you’ stung._

_But Klaus knows ghosts, and if there is any way that Ben managed to avoid the suffering he sees daily, that’s a good thing. He couldn’t just call Ben back, not when he might have made it to someplace better._

_“No, c’mon— Allie, don’t—” She walked off without deigning to hear his defense, and Klaus sighed._

_Allison didn’t try asking again, and Klaus could tell from the way their siblings looked at him that she’d told them not to bother. That he was just being his unreliable self, like always._

* * *

Klaus cannot tolerate the presence of ghosts at all. Although he’d only been wary around the dead as a child, after many experiences ‘training’ for days in the mausoleum, he was left with a deep-seated terror of them.

He doesn’t want to be afraid of his brother. He doesn’t want to be afraid of Ben, who had always been so kind and gentle.

In his experience, murder victims are the worst. Their pain and fury and injustice are constantly at the surface, quickly eroding any sense of self the person once had. The person dissolves, all of their complexity and empathy gone, until all that’s left is an afterimage and a final driving instinct. They’re so desperate that they don’t even care that they’re tormenting a child. They’ve long since lost the ability to care. He doesn’t know if they’ve _ever_ had the ability to care.

Their gory projections and utter inhumanity make Klaus feel sick. They cry for blood and revenge, and he hates them.

He drinks a lot before missions. Enough stolen whiskey, and the pleasantly numb haze keeps him from caring that they’re making people into angry, shrieking ghosts. 

* * *

Ghosts usually wail and scream. They crowd him and threaten and plead, always pushing and overwhelming him. But Klaus isn’t in the mausoleum anymore. There are only a few ghosts tied to the academy, so he’s usually safe. From ghosts, at least. 

He is woken one night, a week after Ben’s funeral, by a sound in the hallway, and his breath catches in his throat. There’s a shuffling sound, like someone unable to walk clearly. 

But there’s nobody it could be. Klaus is the only one of their siblings who is that type of disaster. 

Klaus stares at the door, frozen. His mouth is painfully dry and the edge of his blanket is balled up in sweaty fists.

The ghost of his brother staggers in to the room.

The Horror is out, thrashing senselessly. Where it hits the wall it leaves smears of blood that fade away in seconds. A tentacle lashes the ceiling, leaving a dark spray of little droplets. Ben never really learned to control it, but it seems to be fighting against him harder than Klaus ever saw before.

He knows that ghosts appear the way they died. They manifest like an echo of their deaths, and Klaus cannot look away.

“ _Klaus_ ,” manages the ghost, reaching for him. The ghost of his _brother_ is reaching for him, his chest a mess of gore and monstrous spectral tentacles. Dark red blood gushes out of the chest wound rhythmically, in time with the pulsing of a heart that’s no longer beating. “ _Help_.” Ben’s ghost lurches closer. 

Ben is blocking the door, and Klaus feels trapped. 

As good as sealed in. No way out past the ghosts. Again. 

The arterial blood gushing out around the eldritch tentacles in Ben’s shredded chest dissipates before it hits the floor.

“ _Help me_.”

Klaus barely knows where he is. He remembers the mausoleum so strongly that he feels like he’s there, trapped in a corner with masses of ghosts trying to get him. No escape. Alone with a desperate, pleading ghost spilling gore and viscera, and getting closer. Trying to touch him. 

Klaus screams.

Nobody comes to his aid. 

* * *

The situation could be worse. Klaus already had a reputation for being unreliable, so nobody is surprised when he lets them down yet again.

Allison lets Klaus back into her good graces more quickly than usual. She understands him well enough to know that he is true when it comes to life or death situations. That, yes, he can be lazy, but not when his family is at stake. Anyhow, everyone else is so grim in the wake of the death of yet another brother that she just can’t bring herself to shut out the one person who consistently tries to lighten the mood. 

  
Still, it’s hard to overlook everything. So, they have a little unspoken agreement: if Klaus doesn’t mention Ben, neither will Allison.

Sometimes when they skirt around the topic of their recently deceased brother — that still-fresh wound that stings at the slightest touch, that open grave that they cannot go too near for fear of falling into misery — it feels like pretense. 

In the bright sunlight of early morning, Ben’s ghost is painfully vivid. The Horror comes and goes, and right now it’s gone. Klaus is starting to prefer it gone, even though that means Ben’s ghost has a hole punched clearly through his torso. 

Klaus can see all the way through him. He wonders if this is what someone killed by a cannonball to the chest would look like. Just… dangling bits of gut and neatly sheared bone. 

He can’t look at Ben for too long. The ghost’s colours bleed through loudly in a way that's difficult to ignore, drawing Klaus’s unwilling gaze. Sometimes the ravaged ghost looks realer than the living. 

Days are easier than nights. At least during the day, his siblings are up. He isn’t simply alone in his head with the screaming paper figures of the dead. There are tasks to complete and siblings to goof around with, people to pester and liveliness to see, like fresh layers of paint to cover up the rot. 

The sunlight and people do nothing to help Klaus ignore a ghost’s talking, but hey! Klaus is good at being loud. He can manage. He’s got this.

* * *

  
  
Luther gives Klaus precisely two weeks to be a grieving mess before confronting him. 

Luther squares his shoulders and crosses his arms in the stance he always takes when he is about to talk in a particularly leaderlike way. He seems to think it makes him look taller and more confident, but in reality it just makes him look like an especially arrogant kid. 

"You look like hell," Luther points out, radiating disapproval. 

Klaus presses a hand to his chest in mock offence. “You don’t like my eyeliner? Or is the eyeshadow too much? Thought I’d try sparkly gold today, so Allison and I—”

"That’s not what I’m talking about and you know it,” interrupts Luther, looking a little annoyed. “I’m being serious.”

“Couldn’t tell,” Klaus comments under his breath.

“Your eyes are really red.” 

Klaus knows he looks terrible. Ben’s ghost has been getting more persistent, more pushy. He’s quickly resembling the hollow spectres that Klaus usually sees, and it _hurts_ to see his brother degrade like that. Hurts to see him at all, really. Every time Ben tries to get him alone, to talk, to ask for help, Klaus is dragged back to the mausoleum. The screaming. The pleading. The helplessness. The threats of violence shrieked and hissed and promised from rotting faces.

Klaus hasn’t been sleeping a lot.

Not like he’s going to tell Luther any of this. Klaus knows better by now than to expect too much sympathy from his brother. Luther’s not bad, but he _has_ fully bought into their dad’s narrative that Klaus causes all his own problems. 

Klaus just rolls his eyes good-naturedly and tries to play into his sibling’s low expectations. “Yeah, well, you know me. Course they’re red. You know I don’t smoke _oregano_ , right?”

"No wonder you've failed to conjure Ben." Luther shakes his head, but doesn’t look surprised. “Drugs are really bad for you. Are you even thinking about what you’re doing?"

Klaus laughs. "Oh wow, drugs are bad? I had no idea. Thanks for the hot tip." His eyes are shadowed with fatigue, his movements coloured by that jittery brightness that comes from sleepless energy and stimulants. “Here I thought I was taking vitamins.” He grins and leans casually against the wall. 

Luther does his best stern expression. _He looks almost exactly like dad_ , Klaus thinks. He just needs to work on looking more disappointed. He’s already nailing the aloof asshole part. 

“I know you’d prefer to drink and do drugs rather than train extra hours, but the fastest choice isn’t always the best choice,” Luther lectures. “That’s not a smart way to manage your powers. Now that Five and Ben are gone, we can’t have a dead weight on the team.”

Klaus shrugs. “Like my powers are good for combat? It's not like we lose anything when I shut them off. It’s _aaaall_ benefit!”

“If you go in to a mission drunk, you’ll make mistakes! Your reflexes will suffer!”

“Come on! You think so little of me? I don’t need help from alcohol! I make plenty of mistakes all by myself,” Klaus replies flippantly.

Luther tries to look sterner, making a pinched expression. “Klaus, this is serious. I mean it!”

Klaus fails to suppress a snort. “Why are you making that constipated face? That why you’ve come asking about drugs?”

“Cut it out for one second! If you make mistakes on missions, people could die. You could put your family in danger!” Luther pauses, and then says reluctantly. “Don’t make me go to Dad about this.”

Klaus rests an arm on Luther’s shoulder in a friendly way and grins. “Y’know, your hair’s going to go grey if you keep that worrying up! Don’t worry. I’ve got your back.”

Luther doesn’t shrug him off, and Klaus takes that as a victory. “Good. I really hope you do.”

* * *

Mom stops trying to close off Ben’s room after the door slams open in the middle of the night with a bang as sharp as a gunshot. 

The door had been locked. The cameras detected nobody. 

Shortly after the impact rings out, two of the boys leave their rooms to investigate, tired but ready for a fight. Curfew is strictly enforced, so they sneak. 

Luther’s bedroom isn't even that close, so Diego is nettled to see that, somehow, Luther has arrived first. Diego clutches a throwing knife and peers inside Ben’s room.

The open door yawns darkly, still and silent. Though the contents of the room were left untouched after Ben’s death, the room feels chillingly empty. Moving the door, Diego spots a hole where the doorknob punched into the plaster when it slammed open.

"There's nobody," Luther reports.

"Yeah, well, I want to check for myself," Diego replies a little snappishly.

There's nobody there, and Diego feels a little foolish for waving a knife at an empty room.

Luther is examining the door frame. "It wasn't forced. Someone unlocked the door before they threw it open.”

"But only Mom and Dad have the keys." 

"Exactly." Luther frowns. "I don't see anyone in, and the window is still locked.” He glances over. “We should go back to bed before we get in trouble for breaking curfew.”

“What? You’re not seriously—”

“Go to bed! That’s an order.”

“You’re not Dad,” shoots back Diego. He pokes around for another minute, just to prove that he doesn’t need to follow his brother’s orders, and then returns to his room. It’s the middle of the night, after all, and he already knows he’ll be exhausted in the morning. 

It’s shortly after when Klaus, shaken and pale, stumbles to Diego’s room for comfort. Diego is still awake, after that disturbance, awake but groggy. When Klaus pushes his door open, Diego makes room on the bed without a second thought. It’s not the first time his brother has snuck in after a nightmare. 

Klaus sits on Diego’s bed, pulling his feet up nervously like something under the bed might snatch at them. 

Maybe the monster under the bed is another of those shrieking things only visible to Klaus. Could be, for all Diego knows. 

Diego wraps his arm around his brother in a half-hug, slouching against him tiredly. He doesn’t know what time it is, but it feels like two in the morning. “Nightmare?” He mumbles. “Y’can tell me.”

After a moment, Klaus returns the one-armed hug. “It’s nothing. Just…yeah, nightmare, I guess.” Klaus says distractedly. But there’s something detached about the way he moves, looking around the room like someone in a dream. He has barely even looked at Diego. 

Diego rubs his eyes and tries to focus. His brother seems unusually drained, like he just came from training. Normally Klaus is jittery and talkative and clingy after a nightmare, not zoned out like this. 

Diego gives him a little shake. “You with me?” He looks at Klaus’s face in concern. His brother looks more open than usual, almost vulnerable. After another minute of silence, he rubs his eyes. “I’m gonna sleep. You can stay…”

“Thanks,” Klaus says, stifling a yawn. He slowly tugs back the blanket and then lies down, looking like a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. 

Diego’s already slipped into a doze. But before Klaus can get comfortable, there’s a small sound. 

The door clicks gently shut.

Klaus jerks like the sound is a gunshot, and whips his head around to stare at the door. He scrambles upright, eyes wide. 

The evident panic response startles Diego awake, and he looks around blearily for the threat. Almost everything seems fine.

Klaus’s attention is fixed on something by the door, but Diego barely spares it a glance. He feels very, very awake now. His attention is caught by something far more pressing than a shut door. 

“Hey. Your hands are glowing.”

Klaus jolts, looking for all the world like he forgot Diego was there. “Wha?” He glances down. His fingertips are encased in blue light which recedes too slowly, shrinking away. Klaus shuts his eyes tight and clenches his hands into fists, feeling his nails dig in to his skin. After a moment, the blue light flickers out. 

“Stop,” Klaus mutters. He stays mostly curled up. “Stop, that’s not okay, you can’t just—” He stops for a moment, then replies quickly. “I am _not_! I didn’t do that!”

Diego glances between the empty space Klaus was talking to and his brother. “Is there a ghost? What happened?”

“It’s Ben,” Klaus finally whispers. 

Diego feels his stomach twist hollowly in dread and renewed grief. He had caught a glimpse of Ben’s body after Mom carried him in to the infirmary. He’d stumbled close to the medical table, legs unsteady, and tried to find a pulse, tried to ignore the mess of gore that was Ben’s chest… Even now, Ben’s name brings with it a rise of sickening memories, the scent of iron, the feel of warm blood growing tacky on his skin. He rubs his fingers together to ground himself. His hands are clean, if rough from long days spent training. No blood. 

Diego carefully looks at his brother and tries to gauge how honest he’s being. He can feel his brother trembling. Probably the alcohol, Diego assumes vaguely. He’d seen Klaus drinking a few hours ago, and he still smells vaguely of spirits. 

“You had a nightmare about Ben?” _Please say yes, please say yes—_

“No.” Klaus says hoarsely. His eyes, dark-rimmed with exhaustion, lock on Diego. 

Anger surges up, directed at Klaus. For having the nerve to stumble in, probably still drunk, spouting lies for attention. 

“He’s not here,” Diego snaps. “You’re drunk.” Klaus freezes up, staring at him, and Diego continues, his temper boiling. “You’re drunk and trying to be the centre of attention, like always.” Diego pulls away, scowling. “I don’t care if you want to make yourself look stupid, or get drunk. But leave Ben’s memory out of it.”

“Sure I’m a little buzzed, but I’m not lying!” Klaus’s voice rises desperately. “Diego!”

Diego pushes him away a little too forcefully, and Klaus just pulls his knees up to his chest. “Well, you told us that booze got rid of the ghosts, and you’re wasted right now! So which are you lying about, huh?” 

Klaus’s gaze darts between the door and Diego, like he’s trying to figure out which is less of a threat. “I’m not lying. Not about this. Not about Ben. You think I’d lie about this?” he manages, gesturing emphatically to the side. “He won’t leave me alone, Diego! I don’t want to be alone with him. He’s acting all wrong!”

“This is why nobody trusts you! You don’t have any limits! Nothing’s too low for you. You even lie about Ben for attention!” Diego snarls, his words sharp and painful. He’s sick and tired of his brother’s destructiveness, of his attention-seeking. Using Ben’s death like this is going too far. 

At the sound of footsteps in the hall, both boys freeze. There’s a gentle knock at the door, and then Mom peers in. She tilts her head and smiles a little. “What are you two doing up? It’s past your bedtime.” Her tone is gently chiding, but her expression is fond. 

“Klaus was just leaving,” Diego says before his brother can speak. 

Klaus doesn’t protest. He just slouches, the fight sapping out of his posture almost immediately, and uncurls from where he’s sitting on the bed. He pauses at the door. “See you in the morning,” he says, and then he’s gone. 

* * *

_Dad had been pushing them to train harder. Since Five's disappearance, he had been less tolerant, more driven. Hours and hours of combat exercises, and more than that, of practice with their powers._

_Ben never liked to call up the Horror._

_Not like Dad cared._

_“Again.”_

_“Please, I don’t want to, it hurts—”_

_“I do not recall asking if it hurts, Number Six,” the man barked. “The pain is your doing. It only hurts due to your substandard levels of control. If you give in to weakness, you will never become stronger. Now,_ again _.”_

_The Horror always fought back when Ben summoned it. Pushed and overworked, it—_

_“Again.”_

—snapped _._

_It was furious and aching from overexertion. It lashed out, ready to destroy, to kill._

_But it could not reach their father._

_There was a long scream._

_Ben’s funeral was closed-casket._

* * *

Mom shuts Diego’s bedroom door quietly and turns to her other son. The gentle reprimand she has been intending to say dies on her lips when she sees how her son looks. The slump of his shoulders and the sleepless shadows under his eyes. She recalculates, and then rests a hand on his shoulder. “Is something wrong, Klaus?”

“Course not—” he begins automatically, but then he stops. 

Klaus glances inside his room. The fairy lights are out - lately, the bulbs won’t stop dying - and the open door looks like it has no depth at all, like it's painted on the wall. It doesn’t look real. Klaus can’t remember the last time anything truly looked real. A side effect of the alcohol or the sleeplessness, he expects. He glances back at Mom. His first inclination is to try and tough it out alone, since he’s ruined things with Diego again, but...

Mom is smiling, and kind, and absolutely unshakeable. Klaus cannot even remember seeing her hair out of place. She is steady and reliable, and he _needs_ that so badly he aches. 

"Mom?" he asks, and he hates the way his voice cracks, but he cannot help it. "Can you stay with me tonight?"

“Of course. For a little while. You know what your father would think about this.”

Mom sits primly on the edge of Klaus’s bed. In the light from the lamp on his bedside table, she looks reassuringly solid and alive. 

Klaus doesn’t hesitate. He barrels into Mom’s arms and hugs her tightly. It doesn’t matter that he’s fifteen and his brothers would laugh at him if they saw this. He just needs to know something good is real. He buries his head in the soft blue gingham of Mom’s dress. She stills, calculating a response, and then her hands settle on his back. She holds him comfortingly. 

“Did you have a nightmare?” Mom asks with a fond smile. Like always, she seems happy simply to be around one of her children. To have the chance to soothe her son’s hurt. 

“Mmph,” Klaus mumbles, face pressed against her shoulder. He breathes in the soothing smells of starched clothing and plastic skin, and calms a bit.

“ _KLAUS,”_ shouts the ghost of a woman who stands too, too close to his bed. 

_“Help me,”_ Ben repeats. _“I don’t want to be alone. I don’t want to be dead.”_ Ben stands in the corner, blood-spattered but thankfully no longer corporeal. Klaus covers his ears desperately. He hasn’t told Mom about Ben yet. He can’t stand the possibility of her rejection too. 

_“I don’t want to be stuck here forever!”_

_“KLAUS,”_ the woman’s ghost shouts again. She claws at him, her hands passing icily through, and he lets out a whine. 

“ _Help me!”_

“Leave me _alone,_ ” he says under his breath.

Ben’s ghost starts to scream like something being butchered. _Just like when he died_ , whispers an intrusive thought that Klaus could really do without. He claws at his ears, trying frantically to cover up the screams coming from the bloody figure beside the door.

A soft sound cuts through the ghost’s screams. Mom is humming something low and soothing. It seems like a lullaby. Whatever it is, it’s something to latch on to. 

Klaus curls closer to his mom as she runs her hand through his hair and hums softly.

* * *

Nothing good can last. Not when his father has anything to say about it. 

Honestly, Klaus was lucky to get any reprieve. For a few nights, Mom sat with him and soothed him. He suspects she only dropped by on odd nights she thought his father wouldn’t notice. Still, it was enough. Mom couldn’t keep the ghosts from appearing to him, of course, but he didn’t have to face them alone. She held him, talked to him, and hummed or sang when the ghosts screamed too much. She was solid. She was grounding. And unlike his siblings, she never cared if what he saw was real or not — all she cared was that he was hurting, and she could help.

He wakes up alone every morning. Mom has to leave to charge, after all. But with her there, he can actually fall asleep. 

The reprieve is brief, but he cannot escape notice forever. Not in this house. 

When his father finds out, he is furious. 

“This weakness in you is unforgivable, Number Four! I will not permit you to be babied. You cannot run crying for comfort whenever you find your powers uncomfortable!” Father snaps. “I expected better of you.”

He forces Mom to comply with curfew, commanding her to charge until sunrise, when it would be time to start the day’s chores. Forbidding her from comforting her terrified, haunted son. 

Worse, he cracks down on drugs and alcohol in the house.

Klaus comes back from general training one afternoon with his siblings, overseen by Pogo, to find every last pill and gram of pot gone. Almost all his alcohol is gone, too, everything except a few of the tiny travel bottles. Well. They should be enough to take care of him for a few days.

Except, for some reason, Ben isn’t so easily banished.

For some reason, he can appear even after Klaus has had a drink. All the booze does is make Klaus care less.

On the terrible nights that follow, where Klaus manages an exhausted daze at best, he doesn’t miss how Mom comes to check on him as soon as the sun rises. Exploiting the loophole in her orders as best she can, he knows. 

Knowing that doesn’t do anything to make Ben’s hauntings any better. 

After all, Ben’s learned something new. 

Ben never tried anything too bad when Mom was around. Maybe he didn’t want to upset her, or maybe it was too difficult to do often. But still. Klaus knows. He knows from the night where Ben moved a door _twice —_ somehow, Ben's figured out how to siphon his powers.

Klaus doesn't know how he did it, but the thought that a ghost could simply access his abilities without his consent is _terrifying_.

Or maybe Klaus did it himself, by accident. Maybe he lets Ben move things around without even knowing it. Maybe Ben’s whole presence here is his fault. Everything Ben does could simply be Klaus’s abilities finding new and fabulous ways to absolutely ruin him. Did he summon him accidentally too? Is it possible that he can do powerful things without even being aware of it?

He doesn't know which possibility is worse. 

Whether Ben caused it somehow, or Klaus himself caused it, the possibility is now there. The ghosts can touch things now, touch him now. The ghosts can actually _hurt_ him.

He dreads going back to the mausoleum.

* * *

When Vanya is practicing her violin, she hears quiet talking next door. At the end of the page of music, she gently lays down her violin and tiptoes over to her brother’s room, curious. 

“I already told you, I don’t know how.” Klaus mutters, apparently to thin air. A pause, and then he shakes his head violently. “I hate the old man almost as much as you, but you know I can’t!” He lapses into silence, staring out the window.

_I should knock_ , Vanya thinks. She deliberates at the door. The thought of socializing is stifling, but the sight of her brother in distress is something she cannot turn her back on.

Klaus bites his nails, a distant look in his eyes. The skin around his fingertips is already ripped and bloody, Vanya notices. 

She feels awkward, like she’s seeing him a bit too defenceless. Vanya clears her throat, and he glances over at her. He looks surprised for a second, and then smiles disarmingly.

"Are you okay?" she asks uncertainly. She can't help but feel unsettled by that distant look he had, that one-sided conversation. There’s nothing concrete, but she can’t shake the feeling that something’s up.

“Sure, yeah. Same stuff different day, all’s fine,” he replies automatically. Then, Klaus’s eyes fix on Vanya with sudden clarity. "Hey. Those pills Dad gives you. The anxiety stuff. What're the side effects?

“Side effects? I don't...”

“Do they put you to sleep? Make you feel sick? What?”

“I don't think..." Vanya takes a step back, alarmed. There is an intent look in Klaus’s eyes, and she doesn't like it. "They make me a bit sleepy, but..."

"Something for anxiety sounds really good about now,” Klaus says with an attempt at nonchalance. “You know, with everything gone to hell in a handbasket and all that. If it knocks me out, great. Think it’d mix fine with vodka?"

“I’m not giving you any!” Vanya says with surprising firmness. She takes a deep breath. When she speaks again, there’s a pleading look in her eyes. “You can’t go mixing medicine and alcohol. You could hurt yourself.”

Klaus laughs abruptly. “Sure, I know that. I was just joking.” The smile on his face looks a bit unsteady. 

Vanya hesitates, unconvinced. She settles on, “You know you can talk to me. If you want to talk... about...about Ben... I know you were close. I want to help.” She stands a little straighter, holding fast to that sentiment. If she can just make her brother see that she’s genuine, maybe she can be there for him. Be useful in her _own_ way. She repeats, “I think you’re unhappy. I want to help you.”

Klaus falters at Ben’s name, but his expression returns to something more normal, the friendly joking front, too quickly. “It’s just the usual. Don’t worry!” He gives her a grin. “You know me, weird _is_ normal.”

Vanya looks him in the eyes. “Klaus…”

Klaus pulls her into a quick hug. It's brief, but it still takes her by surprise. “Thanks." He lets go, one hand moving to her shoulder. His eyes light up with mirth. "But enough about me! We loved what you were playing just now! What was it? The theme to Footloose or something?"

Vanya covers a laugh. "You know Dad would never give me popular music! I was playing Ode to Joy."

"Right right right, of course. Bet you could play pretty good modern music, though. Know any Joy Division?"

"I don't have the sheet music." She hesitates, and then adds with a small smile. "But Diego and I have been talking, and… I’ve tried teaching myself something different.” She flushes a little, but looks proud. “Dad doesn’t know. I taught myself without sheet music. Um... I’ve never tried playing it for someone. Would you…?"

He beams. “Of _course_ I’d love to hear my talented sister rock out! Like I’d miss the chance to get in for free before you’re ridiculously famous and playing wherever all the famous violinists play?”

Vanya’s whole face lights up in a smile, and Klaus cannot remember the last time he’s seen her looking so excited. 

They go to Vanya's room, where she stands before her music stand despite not having sheet music, maintaining formal procedure for the sake of her audience of one. Klaus lays with his head dangling off the edge of the bed so the blood rushes to his head and makes him dizzy.

If you asked Klaus to guess what song quiet wallflower Vanya would choose to teach herself in her tiny moment of rebellion, he would have guessed something slow and easy. Maybe John Lennon’s _Imagine_. Something like that. 

When she takes a deep breath to steady her nerves and starts playing the opening riff to _Thunderstruck_ , he laughs in delight.

It’s not perfect by any means, and it’s far slower than the original, but it’s recognizable and she looks so _proud_ of herself. 

Klaus sings along, off-tune but enthusiastic as anything, and Vanya stops worrying about playing perfectly, and together they have genuine, slightly chaotic fun. 

* * *

That night, Klaus takes the little clear orange bottle out of his pocket and looks at it closely. 

Klaus does feel a little guilty. Vanya was trying so hard to be nice, after all. He feels a little bad about stealing her medication, really, he does. 

But it was just _sitting_ there. How could he help his sticky fingers?

“Well, she _said_ she wanted to help,” Klaus rationalizes to himself, trying to temper the hint of guilt as he examines the clear orange bottle and the unmarked circular white pills inside. He has the weirdest feeling that his flawless logic wouldn’t keep Vanya from giving him that wounded expression if she saw he’d stolen from her while she was trying to comfort him.

But he had to. He’s feeling anxious as all hell. Hounded, like there are hostile eyes on him, even at times when he can’t see the ghosts. If they help her, they’ll help him too, right?

It’s not like he _wants_ to steal from his sister, but he hasn’t had the chance to buy more alcohol or pot, much less anything harder, since his father cleared out his stash. All he’s had today are cigarettes, and nicotine’s rush isn’t as effective as it used to be. 

Hell, he even snuck into the infirmary while Mom was busy and tried to break into the cabinet where she keeps the good stuff. Morphine and sedatives, enough to keep him going for ages, all tightly locked up. Too tightly locked up, it turns out. 

Klaus puts the pill bottle down at the edge of the bathroom sink and leaves the room to get a drink. He doesn't have a lot of experience taking pills, and can’t take them dry. 

His little bottle of vodka only has a few drops left. He frowns at it. Surely there was more there yesterday? Did he drink it and forget?

Klaus downs the meagre amount of vodka. _Bet Luther stole it_ , he thinks to himself. The thought of Luther preaching clean living and then skulking around behind everyone’s backs, looking for booze, makes him smile. The image is absurd. 

Klaus searches for his backup plan, the little travel bottles of hard liquor he’d hidden around his room. The little one and a half ounce bottles are so easy to pocket and stash that he usually has several around, but he can’t find any, not even empties. Suddenly, the thought of someone raiding his room isn’t so funny. 

Focused on the search, he takes no notice of the clattering sound down the hall. 

It’s a good twenty minutes later when he finally accepts that he’s out of alcohol. When he finally returns to the bathroom and sees that the bottle with its handful of pills is gone. 

Klaus turns the room upside down in his desperate hunt. He can’t have nothing. There has to be _something_ he can take. 

He finds a clear orange pill bottle in the trash can, but even after combing through the garbage in the half-full can, he doesn’t find a single pill. 

He doesn’t even know if it’s the same pill bottle. 

Maybe Vanya just found her meds and took them back?

Somehow, he doubts it. 

* * *

Klaus doesn’t remember opening his eyes. 

He remembers struggling to fall asleep sober. With his stash of alcohol empty, curfew had fallen before he’d had the chance to hunt for more, and the pills he’d nicked had... vanished. Somehow. Maybe he just misplaced them. 

So… sober. Sober, despite his best efforts. Sober, with the shrieks of the dead to try and keep him awake. 

The next thing he knows, he’s awake in his completely dark room. Mom must have turned off his bedside lamp after he fell asleep. 

Wait… Mom is under curfew. Why is his light out?

He tries to turn his head towards the lamp, tries to lift his arm. Nothing. His body’s not reacting at all.

There’s _something_ holding him down. Locking him in place. He feels so, so tired. Drained, almost.

Adrenaline kicks in and keeps him from falling back asleep. There’s an erratic blue light, like something electric is broken and sparking. Did something shatter his light? Did Ben—?

Klaus starts breathing faster, gaze darting around. He can’t let the dead know he cannot move. Can’t let Ben know. 

An icy hand closes on his arm. He cannot even move enough to see who has grabbed him. When he tries to shout, no sound comes out. 

A blood-spattered face leans over his, only inches away. The stench of blood makes Klaus gag.

The hand moves, readjusts to grip his wrist, and Klaus realizes with a jolt that he can feel the pressure, actual _pressure_ , from that cold, cold hand.

“ _You’ve been ignoring me_ ,” the ghost of Ben says loudly, eyes locked on Klaus’s. 

The hand on his arm is burning him. He’s so, so cold. 

“ _Help me_ ,” the ghost hisses. He moves, and Klaus catches a glimpse of snapped, shattered bones pushed out painfully through skin. There’s something splintery and white glinting at the base of the ghost’s neck, through the shredded red-dyed button-up shirt, and Klaus realizes it’s his shattered collarbone. 

Up close, seeing how the bones jut out, it really does look like something burst out of Ben’s chest. 

_No,_ he tries to say. Not refusing Ben’s request, but refusing everything. A high whine escapes him. 

The sound of very fast breathing, too fast and too shallow, is grating. Ben does not— _can_ not breathe, and Klaus distantly realizes he’s the source of the gasping.

Everything is starting to feel far away, like he has taken a step back from his own mind. 

Distantly, he can see the features of Ben’s face thrown into stark relief by a weak blue light. His chest tingles uncomfortably, the numbness spreading. 

There are black spots in Klaus’s vision and pressure on his chest and he cannot _breathe._

* * *

When Diego comes downstairs for breakfast one morning with his brothers and sisters, it is a surprise to see that Klaus has beaten them there. What’s more curious is that he isn’t acting cagey or doing anything dodgy that might explain his early arrival - he’s simply standing at the bookshelf, reading a book. Something dull-looking by Chekhov, Diego notices. 

  
Diego is not surprised when their father orders Klaus to his office after breakfast. Their father is always pretty clear about his disappointment in Klaus’s attitude and reluctance to acknowledge his powers. Once in a while he tries again to make Klaus cooperate. The summons are not that unusual. 

But... there’s something a little too attentive in the way their father watches Klaus during breakfast. Serious and interested, like he’s realized that Klaus might actually be worth his time. Like a scientist who has spotted a new and worthwhile variable. 

But that’s ridiculous, of course. Dad and Klaus get along the worst, and that’s how it’s always been. 

What _is_ surprising is when Klaus meets Dad’s gaze and nods placidly. Klaus hates training his powers, Diego knows. It’s not normal for him to just accept it without reaction. 

Come to think of it, Klaus is looking calmer today than he has in weeks. Calmer, but not that much better; when Diego glances over surreptitiously, he notices stark purple bruises at Klaus’s wrists, and his brother’s head keeps nodding forward like he’s having trouble staying awake. He’s been looking so rough since... Ben’s death.

Diego feels stirrings of guilt in his chest. Okay, it had been out of line for Klaus to use their brother’s death like that, but he’s looking really bad now. Too quiet, like he’s grieving again, and unusually lucid. Maybe he’s sober? Either way, he looks like he could use the support, and Diego thinks he’s up for it now. 

Diego can drop by his brother’s room after training to make amends. He probably has enough time to ‘lose’ one of his throwing knives in Klaus’s room, so that he can have a reasonable excuse to visit later. 

He’s not that worried, though. Klaus never holds a grudge.


End file.
